United Bank to Pick ATM Supplier

The procurement will likely cost the Bank about 15 million Br

Currently, United owns 60 Automated Teller Machines (ATM), and it issued a total of 107,597 debit cards as of June 30, 2016.

United Bank S.C is set to procure 50 more Automated Teller Machines (ATM) that will likely cost the bank an estimated 15 million Br. This is the bank’s third attempt after cancelling the previous two tenders.

The Bank announced the bid for the procurement of the machines in May 2017 by inviting IT solution providers for the supply of ATMs. The first tender was announced in 2015, and the next in 2016. The last tender was cancelled after the technical and financial stages were begun.

For the third round of tender, three IT solution vendors responded, submitting their technical and financial offers to the Bank.

The Lebanon-based IT vendor, Computer Business Machines (CBM), Moti Engineering Plc, a local IT dealer, and Euronet Worldwide, a US based ATM provider, were the three companies which showed an interest in the tender.

CBM and Moti offered Diebold and NCR brands respectively, while Euronet came with the Diebold Nixdorf brand.

Leaving Euronet Worldwide in the technical evaluation, the financial opening for the two companies was held about four weeks ago. Moti gave the least offer of 15 million Br for the machine and CBM was the second least bidder with 22 million Br for the machines.

In the international market, a single ATM is sold for about 300,000 Br. But, the companies are expected to engage with deploying the machines, giving maintenance services and also providing technical assistance for the banks.

Previously, United awarded CBM for the supply of 50 ATMs. So far, CBM has supplied over 700 ATMs, including 200 ATMs for Commercial Bank of Ethiopia (CBE) in September 2014, 50 ATMs for Bank of Abyssinia (BoA), 100 for Awash Bank (AB), 60 for Premier Switch Solution (PSS), and 35 for Dashen Bank.

On the other hand, Moti, the local IT solution provider and a partner of M2M, a Morocco based company which supplies NCR brand machines, has deployed 3,035 ATMs for most private banks and the state owned giant CBE.

In addition to CBE, Moti supplied 70 machines for Wegagen Bank, 70 machines for Dashen Bank, 59 for Zemen Bank, 10 for Abay International Bank (AIB) and four for Berhan International Bank (BIB).

Since April 2016, Et Switch, established by commercial banks with 80.5 million Br, integrated the ATMs and PoS machines of all banks in the country. The system enables all cardholders to use any of the ATMs available in the nation, paying five Birr service fee for every 1,000 Br withdrawal.

As of June 30, 2016, United owned 90 and 69 PoS and ATMs, respectively. It issued a total of 107,597 debit cards as of June 30, 2016. United is a member of the PSS, which is a consortium of six banks. During the 2015/16 fiscal year, a total of 735 million Br was transacted via these machines out of which 3.8 million dollars came through Visa, Master Card and China Union Pay card users.

Until March 2017, the total number of ATMs and PoS has reached 2,304 and 8,284, respectively. The state owned giant CBE owns over 50pc of the ATMs in the country, with 1,501 machines. At the same time, the total number of ATM cardholders reached 3.6 million, accounting for four percent of the total population.